Fallen Angel
by theKnightHammer
Summary: They say that angels fall first, and the noblest goods are the root of the vilest evils. Roanapur corrupts you slowly, and it always wins or you die. Rock is no exception. Rated for Violence and Language.
1. Entrance and the Yellowflag Rumble

Disclaimer: I do not own anything here except Paladin, and because I don't have him copyrighted, I guess I don't own him either.

"I am not under you  
You cannot play my game and use your rules  
You claim you know me better than I do  
Which one of us does it make a fool?"

----Raise Hell in Heaven by Lordi

It was dusk in Roanapur. The sun reflected off the garbage-strewn waters of the harbor as it sank in the distant horizon. Light danced and played amongst the ripples in the waves and the floating debris lazily as gulls called overhead.

The man watched his boat sail away for a few moments, smoking a cigarette in calm solitude. A shot rang out in the distance, muffled by the city of sin to his back. He didn't flinch, he only continued smoking his cigarette.

He reached slowly into his trench coat, seemed to think better of it as he stopped and instead took his hand out and put it on the butt of one of the pistols that hung from his shoulder harness.

Feeling it's comforting presence in his gloved hand, he took a long drag and finished his cigarette. He flicked the cigarette off the dock and into the water. The water rippled around it. Now just a piece of waste in a sea of waste.

He sighed as he picked up the black military-style duffel at his feet and turned to the city of Roanapur. He began walking.

Just a piece of waste in a sea of waste.

---------------

"Bring me all the Bacardi you got!" Rock and Revy shouted at Bao for maybe the third time that week. It had become their thing, Rock mused as Bao filled his shot glass. It'd been more than a year since he'd left his white-collar life in Japan and threw his lot in with the Black Lagoon Trading Company, and this was how life was. Work, maybe (who was he kidding, usually) get shot at, and then go to the Yellowflag for drinks with the rest of the crew at the end of the day.

It was just him, Revy and the usually rough and tumble crowd in what he'd first referred to as "the bar at the end of the world" when he'd first come here with Revy, Benny, and Dutch. The drinking game was one between Revy and him, and it had started that same night he'd first come to this city of debauchery, violence, and sin.

Sometimes Revy won. Sometimes he won. In the end, it didn't really matter to Rock anymore. There was once a time when he hated drink hard liquor like this, but over time he came to like it. Maybe it was because it was always with Revy, maybe it was just the life he was living now.

Most of the time he didn't really care, this made him happy, and for now, that was all that mattered after a long day.

"Alright, bring it pussy!" Revy exclaimed before downing her shot.

That's the way things for several shots. Neither of them paying attention to the other customers at the bar or taking note of the newcomer that sat down on the stool to Revy's right. Rock, not wanting to get too plastered tonight, admitted defeat for the night.

"Knew you had no balls, Rock," Revy grinned, facing Rock, and threw her thumb towards her shoulder, noting and pointing at the newcomer sitting pretty much behind her at this point. "I'll bet even this weird Wears-My-Shades-Even-Though-It's-Night-Freak could do better than you."

Rock looked over her shoulder at the guy behind her. He definitely wasn't one of the normal crowd. The man was of an average height, definitely taller than he and Revy but not as tall as Dutch. His dark hair was cut into a military crew-cut which brought out the sharp features of his face. Rock couldn't see the man's eyes behind the shades he wore, and he wore a relaxed, if very neutral expression. A long black trench coat hung from his otherwise average-sized frame. Other than his expression, Rock figured the guy was pretty forgettable.

Though is was interesting to see a pistol belt clasped around his waist on the outside of the coat, with many small pouches containing pistol magazines hooked to it and a shoulder rig set-up very similar to Revy's. Except the pistols in his were black and seemingly of the Colt 1911 body design.

He must have been listening, because he turned his head to look at the back of Revy's and said, "I bet I could."

Revy turned to face him, looked him up and down, narrowed her eyes and gave him a grin. "Finally, someone who thinks he's got a pair."

Pulling her own glass across the bar top while motioning to Bao, she said, "Fill 'er up."

For almost the next half-hour, the shaded stranger matched Revy shot for shot and neither was giving up. A small crowd had gathered around. The shaded stranger only showed small signs of even being effected by the alcohol, while Revy was near wasted as Rock had to help her remain in her seat.

"Just give it up, Revy," Rock said. "You've had more than enough. Let's get you back home before you pass out."

"Stow it, Rock, I'm fine," she slurred rather nastily back.

Her shot glass filled up once again, she went to down it and...missed. She spilled the whole shot on herself and wailed "FUCK!"

"I guess that means I win," the stranger said as he put his glass down on the bar top.

"Aww, Paladin, looks like you made a nice lady-friend," came a mocking and surly voice from beyond the crowd, followed by the sound of several weapons being cocked and safeties clicking.

The shaded stranger let out and audible sigh and his black-leather gloved hand tightened around his shot glass. The crowd behind him, Rock, and Revy seemed to disappear as the customers made themselves scarce. The citizens of Roanapur seemed to have a sixth sense for when shit was about to hit the fan.

The man with the surly voice was dressed in the stereotypical combat fatigues and had a pistol in one hand. He was flanked by several of the kind of mercenaries the struck Rock as amateurs and low-quality guns for hire.

"She's a nice lookin' chink bitch to boot, Paladin, and you already got her drunk for us," as he said that, Revy, who was laying her very drunk head on the par, twitched and her eyes narrowed.

"The fuck you say?" Revy reached for her Berreta 9mm Cutlass and fumbled to take it out of it's holster, and pointed it at the man, futilely trying to pull the trigger and it just not clicking in her head that the safety was on.

"I like 'em fiery," the man walked up and put a hand on the shaded stranger's...no, Paladin's shoulder. "I've got you caught and trapped and surrounded. The police back in the States have got quite the price on your head, and they don't care if you're dead or alive. So just make things easy and come along."

Paladin lifted his glass up a bit, as if he were going to try and drink out of it even though it was empty, and then in the blink of an eye slammed it back down on the bar, shattering the glass. He kept some shards in his hand, turned while beginning to stand, and with them in the palm of his hand, slapped them into the bounty hunter's eyes.

The bounty hunter let out a surprised and agonizing howl as his eyes were pierced by the many glass shards pushed in deep by the force of the blow. The pulled the trigger of his pistol, firing wildly into the air while clutching at his face as Paladin pushed him away and towards the floor.

Paladin drew his pistols simultaneously as the other mercenaries in the bar began to bring their weapons up, obviously caught by surprise by the attack and stunned by the manner in which it started.

Revy tried to jump to her feet to get into the fray as well, but lost her balance and fell. The only thing readily available for her to grasp being Rock, and he was caught completely surprised as well and down he went with her. Revy's head hit the floor with a dull thump as Paladin began pulling his triggers.

Rock landed atop her. He took one look at her face and knew she was out.

And they were on the wrong side of Bao's bullet-proof bar in the middle of a gunfight.

The brass fell atop them from Paladin's guns as he dispatched the men inside the bar within seconds. Rock noticed he did so methodically, almost mechanically, without the flair and cockiness that Revy normally displayed.

From outside the automatic weapons fire started up, tearing through the front windows and doors. The hot tracers streaking through the air into the room. Paladin was already on the move.

Rock was well aware that he and Revy were out in the open, motionless, and defenseless unless he did something.

Unless he did something, they were both going to die.

A cold fist wrapped itself around his heart and he stopped thinking. Self-preservation is an interesting instinct. Rock's arm reached out, seemingly of it's own accord, and grabbed the shoulder of the bounty hunter who was still very much alive and screaming in pain from the loss of his eyes. Rock pulled the man towards him and Revy, positioning him into a de facto human shield.

Them man began screaming that he was going to kill that freak and began to reach for Rock's throat. Rock pulled away the man began flailing around again, leaving himself exposed.

He heard the WHISSZZ as a round passed very near his head and cracked into the bar inches from him.

Instincts he didn't know he had took over and her reached out. Instead of grabbing the flailing man's shoulder again, Rock's finger's closed over the man's throat and pulled him back into a position where he would shield both Rock and Revy. The bounty hunter, already in great pain from the shards of glass in his face and eyes and weakened by it, tried vainly to struggle against Rock's grasp.

The man grew weaker and began wimpering. Rock wanted to shut his eyes but was to stunned by his own actions to do anything besides watch as the blood and tears streamed out of the man's slashed and punctured face while his strength gave out.

Throughout all of this, the gunfire lessened some until it died off completely.

Rock didn't see or hear Paladin come back in and pay his tab, as if nothing had happened. He didn't see or hear Bao telling him that was all Revy's fault and they'd better cover the repairs or they'd be getting new assholes in their foreheads. He didn't see the road on the drive back. He didn't see himself taking off Revy's shoulder harness and laying her on her bed. He didn't remember laying on his own bed in another room. He didn't remember sleeping that night.

Because he didn't.

All he remembered was the sight of that man's face slackening and failing, and the sound of his breath stopping between Rock's fingers.

**--Author's Note--**

**Well, it's been a while since I've written. A year or more I believe. Well, I'm sorry for taking Revy out of the game, but after drinking as much as she did (probably without food in her stomach either) I couldn't figure a logical way to get her into the action like I wanted to, in fact, that fight had three drafts before I was satisfied. Well, please read and review. What did you like, not like, where am I doing good and where could I improve, that sort of thing.**

**Edited: April 4, 2009. I cleaned up some spelling errors and changed a few small parts.**


	2. The City Hungers

Disclaimer: See Chapter One for that, it applies here as well.

"Vows are spoken to be broken

Feelings are intense

Words are trivial

Pleasures remain, so does the pain

Words are meaningless

And forgettable"

----Enjoy the Silence by Lacuna Coil

'...and on behalf of my crew I'd like tho thank you for your cooperation," Dutch said, backing away from the crew the had manned the day's target, his revolver pointed in their general direction still. "But know this, we're in a torpedo boat and if anyone follows us, we'll find your asses and send blow this ship to scrap."

Revy watched as Dutch climbed over the railing and slide down one of the ropes securing the _Lagoon_ to the freighter they'd just finished holding up. Dutch was the oldest member of the crew. She didn't know how old the black Vietnam veteran was, probably pushing sixty but not looking a day older than forty and muscled like a Pro wrestler, the captain of the _Black Lagoon _was always calm, cool, and collected. His bald head and sunglasses reflected the light when the light hit them just right, and his old olive drab flak vest laden with shotgun shells and some stain and tears spoke for his experience.

Just like way back in "the day" she ran along the starboard side of the _Black_ _Lagoon_, untying the ropes they'd used to secure their torpedo boat to the side of the monstrous freighter. Her hands speedily undoing the knots, not hindered what-so-ever by the fingerless shooting gloves she normally wore. Usually Rock helped her with this kind of thing, it went a lot faster with two people.

_Where the fuck is he?_ she thought to herself as she pulled the last knot free.

"We're free," she spoke into her headset and braced herself against the railing as the _Lagoon _jerked forward as it suddenly accelerated. She wiped the sweat from her brow and brushed some of the dark hair that wasn't puled into her ponytail out of her face. She leaned against the railing and felt the wind. The pistols in their holsters beneath her arms banged against her sides, She was glad to be in her regular black tank and cut-off jean shorts and casually untied combat boots instead of the rediculous get-up she'd worn to Japan some time back. She still couldn't believe she'd been out in public like that.

After a bit, she began to make her way into the pilothouse, or the bridge as Dutch called it, even though he'd told her once that pilothouse was actually the proper name for it, but that was a long time ago, when he'd first hired her onto the crew. There were a few different faces onboard back then, but people aren't permanent in their line of work.

It shouldn't need to be said, but being a pirate in the South China Sea had occupational hazards.

She sat against the bulkhead just behind the chair that Dutch sat in. She let out a sigh and pulled her pack of cigarettes from her pocket. Tapping the pack lightly, she coaxed one out enough to pull one out with her mouth while she fished in her other pocket for a lighter.

"Revy," Dutch's said from his "Captain's" chair. "Rock's been acting strange for the last few days."

"So what?" she said as she lit her cigarette.

"So, he's been that way ever since the morning after we left you two at the bar," Dutch was stills taring straight ahead. "Normally your business is your own thing, but he's about as withdrawn as he can get. It's my job as your employer to keep you guys in working order. Bad morale's bad for business."

Revy gave the back of dutch's chair a long, sarcastic stare while she listened, her cigarette burning slowly and hanging out of her mouth rather loosely.

"Nothing happened, Dutch," Revy answered his question before he could ask it.

"Something happened," Dutch shot back, putting emphasis on his first word. "If not that, then something else. You were there, now I want you to go out and talk to him."

Revy exhaled smoke as she sighed and begrudgingly got up. As she left she heard Benny's voice pipe up from a room behind the bridge.

"What'd she say?' the blond American asked. Revy stopped to listen, as she was sure they thought she was out of earshot.

"That nothing went on between them. Looks like the drinks are on you tonight, Benny-boy," Dutch's deep voice answered the other member of their four "man" crew.

A quick check around the interior of the _Lagoon_ did not turn up the white collar. Cursing to herself she climbed outside and not long afterwards found Rock on the deck near the bow, laying on his back and smoking. His eyes looked like he was mentally somewhere else.

He was just laying there. Black trousers, white collar shirt, tie, and all.

Revi sat down next to him, lighting up a new cigarette. Rock seemed to be ignoring her.

"What's wrong, Rock?" she asked in a rather bored tone. Not looking at him but rather watching the spray of the water as the _Black Lagoon_ sped over the waves back to port.

"Nothing's wrong Revy," he replied rather distantly.

She let out and exasperated sigh and looked over at him.

"Cut the bullshit, Rock. I ain't out here on your behalf. Dutch told me to talk to you. He's getting concerned, and you know Dutch, being concerned is a big thing."

She let out a stream of smoke as she exhaled. "Shit, you're acting weird enough that they think we're fucking each other."

An awkward silence followed as they both finished off their cigarettes.

"Revy?"

"Yes Rock?" she replied, once again, in an almost bored manner. He was trying her patience. Much as she'd like to think otherwise, it really was in short supply.

"I killed someone," he said in a rather soft and regretful tone.

This was news to her and of all the things he could say to her, almost nothing could have shocked her more.

'When?" she asked simply.

"At the bar the other night," his words were slow. I strangled a man to save our lives."

They were both quiet for most of the rest of the rest of the trip back to port. Rock just laying there and Revi just sitting next to him. Smoking and trowing their ashes and the butts to the wind and sea.

Roanapur came into view as the sun began to set. The hues of light put the city into a dreamy hue, as if to say it had a power beyond what could be comprehended. The reds on oranges on the horizon highlighted and the dark desires of the city's fire to consume those who dwelt there and desire to shed the blood of the weak and stupid,

"How do you do it, Revy?"

"Do what?"

"Keep it from getting to you. How do you shut it out?"

"Two ways. You either put it all in a box and deal with it later, when you have the peace to do it, or you just stop seeing the people you kill as people, and see them as billboards. You size them up for a second before you shoot them, and then you let them pass from your life. If you don't see them as living, then you aren't killing."

Revy knew which one she had chosen. She'd never have the peace to deal with it later.

Maybe one day Rock would.

Honestly, she hoped he would.

**Author's Note: Hope you enjoyed. I really don't have much to say other than writing from Revy's point of view is difficult. She's very removed from anything we'd call normal and that makes it hard to get into her head to even get a decent look at things from her perspective. Despite the difficulty I had here, I feel it came out in the way that does both her and Rock justice.**


	3. War, As It Is Now

Disclaimer: See Chapter One for that, it applies here as well.

"And the innocence you spoil

Find a way to live

Your god is looking down on me

I'm not Jesus, I will not forgive!"

----I'm Not Jesus by Apocalyptica

_"Where is she?" the voice was calm, but with a primal growl behind it._

_"Fuck off," the junkie spit blood out from between broken teeth._

_Harlequin, that's his name. Not but a junkie now, though._

_A sigh escaped. This method wasn't working. A knife is pulled._

_If this level is where it needs to go, some things are more important than souls and humanity._

_Harlequin screams as the skin from his forearm is flayed off. His screams and near incoherent babbling fill the air. The chair he is strapped to rocks in his fruitless efforts to avoid the knife and the angered hands that drive it. Blood drips to the floor and is shaken off by his twitching arm. The pool on the floor grows, slowly flowing to surround the bloody scraps of discarded skin._

_Blood is humanity. The more shed, the less one has._

_"I SOLD HER! I SOLD HER!" he screams. Tears stream from his eyes and he begs. "Please make it stop now, please..."_

_There is only a matter of time before he loses conciousness and bleeds out. Swiftness is now needed._

_"To whom?"_

_The knife is wiped against the junkie's lips. The taste of his own blood spurs his panic. His hair is greasy as a strong hand pulls his cheek against the knife blade. A slight shift of his head pulls the thin skin across the knife edge, blood begins to seep from the scratch._

_He understands what happens next, if he doesn't answer._

_He sobs more and the smell of acrid piss seeps into the air. Animals empty their bowels with death._

_"To the Triads," the words barely come out of his lips. "I sold her to the Triads. We owed so much money. I offered her to them to call it even."_

_He is sobbing and crying. Whether in shame or pain, one cannot tell, but destiny is unaviodable. His fate is sealed. No forgiveness can be found here now._

_Harlequin once claimed to love her, and she him. Sold to slavery for his vices. Innocence sold for greed and addiction. In this world, the addiction of love is nothing to heroine._

_"Specifcally, to whom?"_

_Though he answers, there is no mercy. The road of destiny is set for both. His is to die in pain._

_A road of blood and war is now set. There is no avoiding destiny._

_Humanity be damned._

--===-- TWO MONTHS LATER --===--

"Gods of war, I call you."

Paladin kneeled in the room of a cheap hotel in Roanapur, burning incense in front of him. He picked up the weapon before him, an M-249 Squad Automatic Weapon belt-fed machine gun.

"My sword is by my side," he uttered the words of his mantra as he pulled the bolt back and opened the feed tray, then swiftly sliding an ammo drum into place underneath the reciever.

"I seek a life of honor, free from all false pride."

The round at the end of the ammo belt was seated into place.

"Cover me with death if I should ever fail."

The feed tray came down. It's metallic crunch a tone of finality in the silence around him.

His bags contained everything he'd need this night. His armor, weapons, and ammunition were carefully packed away. He placed the machine gun in a duffel.

Hopefully tonight it would be over.

But Paladin didn't trust to hope anymore.

All the pieces were set now. The Triad peon at the docks had told him what he needed to know, and that piece of trash was probably being eaten by the gulls by now.

A cab dropped him off a few blocks from the point where the exchange was to take place. He walked wth his two heavy bags the rest of the way. Visually reconning the coming battleground, he picked out the most likely escape routes his prey would try to use. The streets were not too busy, being dusk. He expected them to be empty after dark.

Leaving his gear under some trash in an alley. He circled the warehouse twice. Noting all exits and entrances, to pick the best one for him to slip in.

He took the time to place a detonation charge to take care of the local power.

_Darkness is always your friend,_ the words of his old sergeant resounded in his head. _The dark is a primal fear of man. Fear is a force multiplier in the face of stacked odds._

Force multipliers were important, especially when you are just one man.

Retrieveing his bags, he decided to slip in an broken ground-level window. Inside the warehouse there was a few back offices but many, many crates stacked on the main floor. He noted the lack of overhanging walkways and high windows. He wouldn't have to worry about death from above, and unless the enemy was stupid enough to climb the crates, he was fighting in a two-dimensional battelfield.

Towards the main door fo the facility was a clear space. If the exchange was to take place in this building, this is where it would be. He quietly put his bags down. Unzipping them to reveal his armor and weaons. He removed his pistol belt and harness, as well as his trench coat and shades. He holstered his twin pistols on the armored plates on his thighs, donned his body armor and kevlar choulder paulrons. The ceramic plates they were woven around would do more than to just provide his upper arms with shrapnel protection. He was sure they could resist 9mm.

He already wore kevlar sleeves around his forearms, as well as his kneepads and boot knife.

He sheathed a pair of fighting knives underneath each armpit. He trusted their seven inch blades more than any other piece of equipment. They'd seen him through peace and more than a few wars.

He checked his ammo pouches and the grenade pouches for his grenade launcher, as well as slip a dew-rag over head and strap his helmet on. Ranges would be too short in here to make use of his high explosive grenades, but the buckshot rounds for it may be useful.

He took his M-4 assault rifle with underbarrel M203 40mm grenade launcher out of his second bag. He ensured it was loaded and inserted a 40mm buckshot round into the 203's breech. He slung that weapon and picked up his final peice of kit, the machine gun.

_A close ambush is the preferred method of attack. It produces the maximum amount of casualties in the minimum time, _ his old sergeant's words always rang true. _Hit hard and fast from one direction, then before the enemy's confusion can clear and he can take appropriate action, overpower and overrun his position._

Slinking into a shadowy corner of the warehouse. Paladin began to wait.

**Author's Notes: Phew, it's been a long time. It took me a while to figure out where to contimue from the last chapter. Originally it was more Rock and Revy interaction and that was rewritten a few times and the pace really bogged down for me to even sit and read it. This chapter was supposed to be much longer, but the plot bunnies have been hopping around my keyboard lately and I decided to split this one up so expand on the second half of it.**

**So enjoy and please review, all constructive criticisms are welcome.**


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